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For Growth, Be Helpful

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Question: How can a media grow its audience in a time of so many free and accessible information sources? Not to mention shorter and shorter attention spans? Seems hopeless….

Answer: By changing our focus. Instead of trying to grab and hold eye balls (the slippery buggers), let’s provide helping hands. That’s to say, let’s create [...]

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Toward a new set of “beats”?

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In their book The Abundant Community John McKnight and Peter Block list seven “responsibilities” of a community set on maximizing the use and cultivation of its own, inherent assets. These seven responsibilities are:

HEALTH – individual physical and psychological well-being, as well as the well-being of the community at large SAFETY – security and [...]

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Building Context

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One of the concepts we talk about often with community building through a media company is laying out the context a specific community or issue lives in. A media company is perfectly suited for this work, which is why and how it can become a powerful force (for good, of course) in building communities.

Here [...]

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Teams, networks, and communities

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In modern philosophy natural kinds are things in our world that are not dependent upon human existence or interest. Copper is a natural kind, heat is a natural kind, evaporation is a natural kind. These things would be what they are irrespective of our being here or not. Thus, because they have essences that do [...]

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A model for media engagement

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One of the assumptions that seems to underlie our collective understanding of community building is the principle of organic growth, of change from the inside out. This is a gentle rejection of the solutions of days past in which help was to be sought in some government funding, in changing a law, or in persuading [...]

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The Importance (and Problem) of Common Frameworks

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One of our assumptions in this ongoing discussion is that our work will be most fruitful if we spend a large portion of our time preparing the soil. Quick, flashy top-down projects may create some immediate sense of satisfaction, but if we want to help foster a vibrant community that is able to sustain itself [...]

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